A Study in Chinto

Michael Cassidy, a new NiDan, in 1992, performing Chinto Kata.

On Saturday morning back in 2005, while driving to class, a new way of considering some of Chinto’s application potential presented itself to me.

Consider this section in Chinto Kata

1. You draw the right foot back and twist your body clockwise into a right cross stance as you perform a double rising wedge strikes. [feel free to derive a better term!]
2. Then your left foot steps forth (with a crescent step) and you perform a simultaneous left low strike and right high strike.
3. Next your right foot steps forth (with a crescent step) and you perform a simultaneous right low strike and a left high strike.

My application analysis for this section has never been one I’ve been totally comfortable with, and the various studies I’ve completed have never fully taken these techniques into account.

Sure the obvious ‘missing’ front kick (a real hidden technique possibility) between movement 1 or 2 presents itself.  For movement 1. the potential for double blocking similar to boxing rope-a-dope is there. Charlie Murray was shown how this movement could be used to trap an arm during his stay in Okinawa, but on the whole, I still wasn’t very satisfied.

What came to me was one series of potential against grab and yank situations. Perhaps many of us don’t worry about such, feeling our size or power make it unlikely that such will occur.  But such attacks do exist and the more we understand our kata potential, the more complete our response capability becomes.

Several other opening thoughts.

First, if you’re being grabbed and yanked, its unlikely you will draw back into the cross stance as Chinto shows. I choose to explore the stepping out into the cross stance (akin to its use in Seisan kata) as I perform the double rising blocks.

Second, when moving into the stances it is necessary to orient yourself to take advantage of the application potential. That means you aren’t necessarily moving straight forward as in the kata, but perhaps on an angle, yet the finish of the stance and technique are as clean and precise as doing Chinto alone. This requires you use your full body potential. Keep your weight centered on the balls of your feet to finish your body alignment correctly and use your knee release in your technique to fully exploit your body’s power.

Your skill in performing Chinto kata is fully required to draw forth these applications effectively.

1. Opponent grabs your left wrist with their right hand and pulls you sharply forward.
1. [First Movement} You step across with your right foot and twist your body clockwise to form the right cross step. Doing this you execute the double rising wedge strikes, by first turning your left hand (palm side) in towards your chest and drawing your right fist across your left forearm, then pulling your right hand back and turning your left palm away from you as you finish the double strikes.  This movement separates their grab with the action of your right arm.
2. [Second Movement} You step forward with your left foot, but when you place the ball of that foot down, and you shift your weight onto the left foot, your body rotates counter-clockwise as you set into left foot forward Seisan Stance but so your own chest crosses their arm about 20 degrees.
3. As this takes place your right hand opens and you rotate your right forearm so your palm faces away from you (though not called for, this pressing motion could be an opening for an arm grab too.) The other half of the motion is a left descending hammerfist strike. [For safe practice strike into your opponents lower left (as you see it) abdomen.] There are a variety of targets of opportunity such as the left hand little knuckle striking into the point 1” below the male left chest nipple, by my all time favorite is to slice across the side of the ribs where there is no meat protecting the ribs, just lots of nerves and bone underneath.
4. [Takedown] Such as strike itself isn’t often enough. By grabbing their wrist and then stepping across their line of attack with your left foot, and striking (rolling across) their biceps tendon you can force the opponent down into the ground.

2. Opponent grabs your right wrist with their left hand and pulls you sharply forward.
1. [First Movement] You step across with your right foot and twist your body clockwise to form the right cross step. Doing this you execute the double rising wedge strikes, by first turning your left hand (palm side) towards your chest, and drawing your left fist across your right forearm, then pulling your left hand back and turning your right palm away from you as you finish the double strikes. This movements separates their grab with the action of your left arm.
2. [Third Movement (skipping the second movement) being creative], Draw your weight back on your left foot allowing you to step forward with your right foot. Your body will roll counter-clockwise during the right stepping motion but then roll clockwise at the completion of this section.
3. As this takes place your left hand opens and you rotate your left forearm so your palm faces away from you (though not called for this pressing motion could be an opening for an arm grab too.) The other half of the motion is a right descending hammer fist strike. [For safe practice, strike into your opponents lower right (as you see it) abdomen.] There are a variety of targets of opportunity such as the right hand little knuckle striking into the point 1” below the male right chest nipple, but again I favor slicing across the side of the ribs.
4. [Takedown] Such as strike itself isn’t often enough. By grabbing their wrist and then stepping across their line of attack with your right foot, and striking (rolling across) their biceps tendon you can force the opponent down into the ground.

3. Opponent grabs your left hand with their right hand (cross hand grab)
1. This grab doesn’t allow the previous techniques to work as well, but we can readily defeat it by drawing on the kata in a different manner.
2. [First movement] You step across with your right foot and twist your body clockwise to form the right cross step. Doing this you execute the left arm rising strike, by first turning your left hand (palm side) towards your chest, and using your right rising strike, to smash into their wrist, freeing your left hand
3. You can then complete this section as shown in number 2 above.

4.  Opponent grabs your right hand with their left hand (cross hand grab).
1. Your response is the reverse of above

A note on 3 and 4, the cross hand grab does not come free with the double rising strike, but striking into the wrist will readily effect release from the grab.

5. Opponent grabs your left shoulder (or upper left arm) with their right hand.
1. [First movement] You step across with your right foot and twist your body clockwise to form the right cross step.
2. While doing this your rising left strike opens their right arm to the left.
3. At the same time your are striking upwards with your right fist into their solar plexus. This creates one heck of a shock into the opponent.
4. Alternatively, you could be doing a right uppercut underneath the opponents jaw.

This last technique reminds me of the shocking energy developed in Hsing I kung fu, and similar strikes from Tai Chi

I don’t see this analysis as even close to completely describing this section of Chinto’s application potential.

My studies also point out these are very skilled responses. Simply knowing Chinto kata does not mean one is prepared to sell these applications. By way of example, this training would never be part of my kyu curriculum, and where I have a group of experienced Dans training with me, most of them would not choose to sell these applications during conditions extremis. In their case they would likely choose a different response.

But being trained in application and choosing not to respond with a technique series, is vastly different from not knowing its existence.